Creed crouched low among the thick underbrush, his sharp eyes scanning the treeman hideout like a hungry predator stalking a herd.
A flicker of movent caught his attention. It was Tierra, silent as a whisper, vanishing into thin air once again like a ghost with murderous intent.
He couldn’t help but smirk. ’She’s terrifying,’ he thought, not for the first ti.
There was no other way to describe it. Tierra wasn’t just stealthy. She was built for this.
The way she moved without sound, struck without warning, and vanished without trace; she wasn’t a fighter; she was a living, breathing assassination protocol!
With a single, subtle nod from Creed, she was gone again like a leaf in the wind, and the next minute played out like a deadly symphony.
One by one, the remaining treeman guards stationed on the outskirts of the settlent—five of them, all stage threes—were taken down with surgical precision.
No struggle. No noise. Just quiet, brutal efficiency.
Creed watched as their bodies slumped silently into the foliage below, and he had to admit: if he ever turned evil, Tierra was definitely going to be his number one enforcer.
Probably his entire hit squad!
And now, with the periter wiped clean like a plate after dinner, it was ti to make a little noise.
’Lilith,’ he called in his mind.
Instantly, a loud crack of lightning answered as Lilith burst into existence above the treeman village, her entire body glowing like the wrath of the storm.
Purple sparks danced around her in wild spirals as she raised her hand and hurled down a volley of thunderclap orbs, each one trailing lightning like a teorite from the heavens.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
The settlent erupted. The treehouses shook violently as the explosions tore into the wood, vines snapped like cords, and one of the canopy bridges burst apart into flaming splinters.
It was glorious. Gloriously loud, gloriously bright, and gloriously terrifying.
From all corners of the hideout, treen stumbled out of their treehouses in confusion, shrieking in their weird groaning language.
Their bark-like skin was covered in sap and smoke, their leafy manes flaring out like they’d just rolled out of bed to find their house on fire—which, to be fair, was exactly what had happened.
But Creed wasn’t watching the chaos. He was watching the big house. The largest treehouse in the center.
If a stage 5 treeman chieftain was here, that’s where it would be sleeping, sipping moss juice or doing whatever bark-covered murder-lords did in their spare ti.
He narrowed his eyes.
Nothing.
Still no presence strong enough to match the pressure he felt back in the last encounter. That ant...
He grinned. "Looks like it’s ti to rumble."
He reached out to Lilith with his thoughts. ’Stay in the sky. If the chieftain cos back, we’re gone.’
Her acknowledgnt was a sharp pulse in his mind, and with that, he turned to Amara and Tierra.
"Let’s paint this forest red"
Boom!
With one trendous leap, Creed launched himself into the air like a missile, his clothes fluttering behind him and his spear glinting in the sunlight.
He soared high and landed with a thud onto one of the narrow canopy bridges stretched between two treehouses—right between two unlucky, terrified stage 3 treen who looked like they had just watched their grandparents explode.
Creed didn’t hesitate.
He spun his spear once, casually, like he was warming up for a show and then swiped horizontally.
Snick.
Two heads, cleanly severed, arced through the air like a pair of dodgeballs, thudding onto the bridge behind him.
He didn’t even look back as he started sprinting down the narrow walkway, his eyes now set on the group of treen charging toward him from the next intersection.
There were maybe ten of them, but the bridge was narrow so only two could stand side by side.
Perfect.
Creed’s grin widened. This was the mont.
With a twist of his grip, he activated the second spear technique he had mastered; Double Pierce, a peak stage 2 technique!
As he thrust his weapon forward, the spearhead seed to split mid-air into two streaks of grey energy, like mirrored lightning bolts tearing through space.
FWOOM!
The twin beams lanced forward and drilled through the heads of the first two treen so fast that neither had ti to scream.
Sap burst out the back of their skulls in sticky green arcs as they fell.
The rest of the group froze. They looked at the holes in their friends’ heads. Then they looked at Creed. Then back at the holes. Then back at Creed.
Creed raised an eyebrow, smirked coolly, and said, "Hey, you guys ever tried not dying horribly? No? Just thought I’d ask."
They stepped back.
Too late.
Creed’s lower body suddenly glowed with a deep brown light; aura, powerful and fully activated!
Swoosh!
He launched forward like a cannonball, his entire body blurring into a streak of blue and brown. He passed through the treen like wind through a forest.
PAF! PAF! PAF! PAF!
One by one, heads burst open like lons hit with sledgehamrs. Treen groaned in confusion, their sap spraying wildly in all directions, their bodies collapsing like logs.
"Too easy," Creed muttered, then...
WHAM!
A sudden, massive force struck his side.
Eyes widening, Creed barely had ti to twist his spear into a defensive block as a giant wooden club slamd into him from the left.
The force was monstrous. It was raw, brutish power and it sent him flying off the canopy bridge like a ragdoll!
He twisted midair, trying to regain balance, but the montum was too much. He crashed through the branches below, hit the ground hard, and rolled into a cloud of leaves and dust.
He groaned, spitting out a twig. "Alright. That one’s not stage three..."
Before he even had ti to breathe, a chill crawled up his spine—a primal sense of danger screaming at him like a fire alarm.
He didn’t stop to think. He rolled.
Boom!
Just as he did, the earth behind him exploded with a loud boom, the giant wooden club smashing down into the exact spot where his skull had been a second ago, flattening the ground like a giant’s slap.
With a sharp grunt, Creed flipped onto his feet in one fluid motion, his body moving faster than his thoughts.
He barely had ti to steady his breathing when the club ca crashing down again from above like a teor falling from the sky. But this ti, Creed was ready.
With a flash of instinct, he activated the first pounce of his Triple Pounce Movent Technique, and in the blink of an eye, his figure blurred and vanished from the spot.
He reappeared a few ters away, casually sidestepping the impact as though dodging falling raindrops.
The club smashed into the earth again, tearing a crater into the ground and sending dirt flying everywhere.
Then Creed saw him.
Standing amidst the debris, surrounded by smoking roots and broken earth, was a monster of a treeman.
He was massive—taller than most of the others, with thick bark that looked like ancient armor and glowing purple vines twisting around his arms and skull like war tattoos.
He radiated power like a furnace. Creed’s eyes narrowed. ’Peak of Stage 4... but that pressure...’
Creed’s heart thumped once.
’This guy’s pressure is at Stage 5!’
That was not normal. That ant... there were geniuses among treen too?
And this one? He was the valedictorian of the "Smash All Humans" Academy!
Cracking his knuckles with a grin, Creed spoke in a voice only Lilith could hear. ’Any signs of a real Stage 5 approaching?’
Lilith’s calm voice echoed in his mind. ’Coast is still clear, Master. No other high-level signatures nearby.’
"Good," Creed said, his smile sharpening into sothing dangerous. ’Then I guess I’ve got ti to play.’
Boom!
The air around him shimred as he activated his Path of Killing, a fearso aura enveloping him in blood-red light.
His eyes turned cold, sharp as blades. His spear glead, vibrating lightly in his grip like it could taste the battle ahead.
The ground cracked beneath his feet as he crouched low, activating the second pounce, and boom, he launched forward like a missile.
The treeman roared, its glowing vines writhing around its body like angry snakes.
With a snarl, it swung its club in a mighty horizontal arc, aiming to turn Creed into forest paste.
But Creed had already teleported, disappearing mid-dash and reappearing beside the treeman like a shadow.
Double Pierce!
Creed’s spear shot forward, splitting into two grey beams of death; one aiming for the treeman’s skull, the other for its heart.
The sheer speed and intensity of the attack, now enhanced by his Path of Killing, made the very air tremble.
But then, the vines pulsed.
The purple glow around the treeman intensified, and for a second, the treeman’s pressure spiked even higher. It let out a guttural roar and leapt back at the last second.
A perfect dodge?
Nope. Creed had already predicted that!
In the middle of his strike, he vanished again, teleporting behind the treeman like a phantom and reappearing just as the club was swinging wide.
The treeman whipped around in panic and tried to block with its massive weapon, but Creed’s spear was already piercing forward.
Bang!
The first beam was deflected—barely—but the second beam struck true, slamming into the treeman’s chest and exploding with force.
Bark and vines shredded as the monster was flung backward like a leaf in a hurricane, crashing into the trunk of a massive tree with a thunderous crack.
Creed didn’t stop.
He pounced again, closing the distance in an instant to finish the job, but suddenly, dozens of stage 3 treen threw themselves between him and the injured one.
Like living sandbags, they hurled themselves at Creed, trying to stop him with their bodies alone. It was almost... reverent.
Creed’s eyes flickered.
’They’re... protecting him.’
He cleaved through them rcilessly, spear dancing like a reaper’s scythe. Heads flew, sap sprayed like water from a broken pipe, and bodies crashed to the forest floor.
But still, they ca.
"Ah," Creed muttered, lips curling in amusent. "So you’re not just strong, you’re quite special."
He was going to kill this tree. Hard!
With a flicker, he teleported behind the mob, appearing in front of the wounded treeman again. But this ti, the treeman was ready.
The purple vines pulsed violently, and the roots around the treeman suddenly glowed, brighter and angrier than ever before.
With a low growl, the vines on its body burrowed into the earth, and in the next instant, the roots erupted from the ground, sharpened like spears, and shot toward Creed from every direction.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
Creed’s eyes widened slightly. ’Seriously?!’
He instinctively moved to teleport away, but nothing happened. He tried again. Still nothing.
Then he felt it. A creeping heaviness pressing on every part of the air around him. The purple aura had spread, locking down the very space he was standing in!
’A space-locking aura?’ he thought in disbelief. ’So that’s what those vines are doing... they’re sealing the surrounding space to trap enemies!’
The roots shot forward.
Dozens of them, like purple daggers flying through the air.
Creed stared at them calmly.
Then smiled.
"Alright," he whispered. "Let’s see what happens when I go all in."
Boom!
The red aura around him thickened, turning into a whirlwind of murderous intent. His spear began to vibrate, the very air trembling around its edge.
His eyes were steel. His breathing calm. His battle intent surged, like a storm barely contained in human flesh.
And then, he activated the third pounce!
BOOM.
Creed exploded forward like a cannonball of death, heading straight into the storm of vine-spears. The sky above cracked with distant thunder.
’Let’s play!’
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